Bei­jing: China on Sun­day launched on­line ser­vices to ac­cel­er­ate the in­stal­la­tion of elec­tronic toll col­lec­tion (ETC) de­vices as it aims to au­toma­tise pay­ment for 80 per cent of the coun­try’s reg­is­tered ve­hi­cles by the year end.

Driv­ers can now ap­ply on­line for in­stal­la­tion free of charge, have the de­vices de­liv­ered to their doorstep, and ac­ti­vate via the State Coun­cil app or the of­fi­cial WeChat ac­count of the Min­istry of Trans­port. China now has some 107 mil­lion ETC de­vices, and the num­ber of users is expected to grow to 180 mil­lion by the end of this year, ac­cord­ing to the min­istry.

Last year, only 30 per cent of the coun­try’s 240 mil­lion ve­hi­cles adopted ETC sys­tems.

To step up adop­tion, the coun­try also of­fers driv­ers who use the sys­tem dis­counts of at least 5 per cent on toll charges.

The moves are part of a broader plan to im­prove the ef­fi­ciency of road trans­port and re­duce lo­gis­tics costs.

The rapid pop­u­lar­i­sa­tion of ETC also lays a solid foun­da­tion for re­mov­ing all ex­press­way toll booths at provin­cial borders by the end of the year, said the min­istry.